Chapter 26: Where Spring Meets Autumn (2)

Some distance away from the Twin Seasons Tree, Gu Yuan sat cross-legged beside Ji Yan, watching Ji Yue work around the enormous tree as she carefully arranged one part of the Array Formation after another.

The sight was strangely peaceful.

Sitting there with nothing particularly urgent to do, Gu Yuan couldn’t help but wonder whether the cultivation world was really supposed to be this peaceful.

Most of his time in the Black Desolation Sect had been spent forging, cultivating, and dealing with one absurd situation after another. So now, sitting beneath the shade of the Twin Seasons Tree with the gentle breeze passing through the grass, he almost felt like he was on a trip rather than preparing for a ceremony that would seal his fate.

His gaze shifted to Ji Yan sitting beside him.

For once, her usual fiery personality seemed to have quieted down

"What the fuck are you staring at?"

...Or maybe he was wrong.

"Are you sure you want to go through with this?" he asked. "Becoming Dao companions with me?"

Unlike Ji Yue, Ji Yan had never seemed particularly happy about the arrangement. If anything, she had spent most of their interactions making it clear that she would rather not have him around.

"Don’t fucking ask. I’m already thinking about running away."

Gu Yuan raised an eyebrow.

Despite the harsh words, however, he noticed something that had changed.

He remembered the gaze Ji Yan had given him when they first met, the undisguised disgust and rejection that had seemed almost instinctive. That feeling was no longer there.

Her tone was still as unpleasant as ever, but when he looked into her eyes, he no longer felt that same repulsion.

What had changed? Could it really have been because of that test?

He didn’t know.

Gu Yuan let the matter rest for the moment and turned his attention back to Ji Yue.

She was still working on the formation, moving around the Twin Seasons Tree with practiced ease as one complicated array pattern after another took shape beneath her hands.

Gu Yuan knew very little about formations, but even so, he could tell that what she was constructing was far beyond anything an ordinary cultivator could casually arrange. He couldn’t help but wonder just what level her attainments in formations had reached. Was she perhaps already an earth-grade Array Master?

Whatever the answer was, it certainly didn’t look like something a Golden Core cultivator should be able to accomplish so casually.

"Is becoming Dao companions normally supposed to involve all this?"

"Of course not. Normally, you wouldn’t need to go through all this trouble just to become Dao companions."

"Then why are we doing it?"

Gu Yuan turned toward her, his curiosity evident.

Ji Yan frowned for a moment before a playful look gradually appeared in her eyes.

"You want to know?"

Gu Yuan immediately became wary. Still, after a brief hesitation, he nodded.

"Tell me."

Ji Yan leaned back slightly, looking toward the formation taking shape around the tree.

"This is a ceremony to link our fates together. After it, you will become the only one for us, and we will become the only ones for you. Essentially, it’s an imprint that finalizes that connection."

Gu Yuan’s expression slowly became more serious.

"With that imprint, no matter what happens in the future, even if you die or we die, when we reincarnate, our fates will eventually bring us together again."

She turned her head and gave him a smile.

"So, from that point onward, you’re stuck with us forever."

Gu Yuan’s gaze dropped. For several seconds, he was completely speechless.

He had expected the sacred ceremony to be important, but this was far more serious than he had imagined.

Ji Yan watched his reaction with amusement.

"Why? Having second thoughts?"

"And if I did?" Gu Yuan finally raised his head.

"If you don’t agree, then we simply don’t do it. We can’t force you. The ceremony won’t work unless all three of us agree to it wholeheartedly."

Gu Yuan’s eyes immediately brightened at her words.

Ji Yan noticed it and the corners of her lips slowly curved upward.

"We can’t force you," she said, her tone almost innocent, "but that doesn’t necessarily mean you have a choice, you know. You don’t seriously expect Yue to be as gentle as me... do you?"

Where exactly is this gentleness you’re talking about? Gu Yuan wondered.

The implication behind her words was obvious enough. The ceremony being voluntary doesn’t necessarily mean he is free to simply walk away.

Still, after calmly thinking it through, Gu Yuan found that the situation was actually more favorable to him than he had initially expected.

Coming this far, he had never truly intended to refuse them. So, the only difference was that he had apparently been given a choice that wasn’t really a choice.

As for not being able to take another Dao companion, he didn’t particularly care. One Dao companion would have been enough for him in the first place. Getting two was already far more than he had expected.

The reincarnation part didn’t bother him much either. It’s not like he plans to die. It was merely a promise concerning a future that might never even come.

More importantly, if they genuinely regarded him as their Dao companion to the extent of going through a sacred ceremony that would bind their fates together, then perhaps he was more important to them than he had initially assumed.

That meant he probably wouldn’t need to constantly worry about them treating him poorly.

At least until he became stronger than them, his position should be quite secure.

Thinking about it this way, Gu Yuan actually felt rather relieved.

"That’s good."

The calm acceptance clearly flustered Ji Yan, who had expected him to complain, protest, or perhaps even try to run.

She turned her attention back toward Ji Yue, saying nothing.

This guy...

She couldn’t help but feel slightly disappointed.

After a moment, however, Gu Yuan’s voice sounded beside her again.

"How was the war?"

"Took you long enough to ask."

Ji Yan twisted her lips.

When you were the main reason it happened in the first place...

She kept that thought to herself.

Gu Yuan nodded. "I’m naturally curious. I was in seclusion, so I couldn’t ask anyone about it. Hopefully, you two didn’t get injured or have too difficult a time."

Ji Yan glanced at him.

"There isn’t anyone in this world capable of giving the two of us much trouble."

Her tone was casual, yet it still carried unshakable confidence.

"We crushed them. The Crimson Flame Sect lost more than half of its elders. Their Great Elder died, and their Sect Master was seriously injured. They’re finished."

"The war is basically over now. There are a few other sects trying to fish in troubled waters, but they’re hardly worth mentioning."

Ji Yan gave only a brief overview of the situation without going into much detail, but even that was enough to leave Gu Yuan unexpectedly enjoying the conversation.

Perhaps it was because, unlike before, she no longer spoke to him with that undisguised hostility.

Or perhaps he was simply getting used to her personality.

At first, he had thought this redhead would be even more troublesome than her sister. Yet after actually talking with her, Gu Yuan found that she was surprisingly easy to deal with.

At least with her, a conversation was possible.

His gaze drifted toward Ji Yue, who was still working beneath the enormous tree, and a strange thought suddenly crossed his mind.

If this tree represents the two seasons of spring and autumn...

Then, strangely enough, Ji Yan felt like spring to him, while Ji Yue was more like autumn.

Spring came after the harsh winter. The trees regained their leaves, flowers bloomed, and everything seemed to come alive again.

Ji Yan was somewhat like that. She was fiery, lively, and troublesome, but there was a certain vitality about her that made being around her surprisingly comfortable.

Autumn was different.

It was beautiful, but that beauty came with the knowledge that everything was slowly fading. The flowers withered, the leaves turned dry and fell, and eventually only the branches and trunk remained.

Ji Yue was like that.

Beautiful and calm on the surface, yet beneath that beauty was a coldness that made him instinctively wary.

After surviving the harsh winter, he’d get spring in the form of Ji Yan...

Gu Yuan glanced at Ji Yue.

But after enduring the scorching summer, he’d only get autumn.

He couldn’t help but feel that the comparison was strangely fitting.

Of course, he couldn’t be certain. He still knew far too little about either of the twins to make such judgments.

For now, it was simply the impression they gave him.

-------

Time continued to pass.

After that conversation, Gu Yuan returned to cultivating, while Ji Yan did the same beside him. Neither of them spoke again.

Their conversation had merely removed some of the hostility between them. It hadn’t magically erased all their differences, much less turned them into lovers.

They were still two people who barely understood each other.

So they simply cultivated, and time passed.

Only one full year later did Ji Yue’s voice finally ring out across the quiet clearing, pulling them both from their meditation.

"It’s done. We can finally begin the ceremony."